


The Sacrifice

by Rubynye



Category: Original Work
Genre: F/M, Minor Character Death, Other, Ritual Sex, Stranger Sex, Strangers to Lovers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-25
Updated: 2019-01-25
Packaged: 2019-10-15 21:42:21
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,461
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17536781
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rubynye/pseuds/Rubynye
Summary: Clean and empty, I awaited the coming of the god.





	The Sacrifice

**Author's Note:**

> Written a looooooong time ago, posted for random amusement.

The Sacrifice

Clean and empty, I awaited the coming of the god.

It was the night of my seventeenth birthday, and I knelt in the smallest, innermost temple courtyard, hearing the birds sing in the springtime and trembling for fear. Dressed in a sheer white linen robe, I knelt, my feet bound to prevent my running away, my hands bound, to prevent my untying my feet. I was bound with embroided red woolen ribbons, so it would be more comely, but I was bound all the same.

As I waited in the sweet spring night, I thought over my short life. I was a young priestess of our lord Alixias, serving out my four year term in the joy of my maidenhood, in his temple in his sacred city of Darstela. Each year, on the second full moon of the spring, he chose one of us through his oracle to be that year's sacrifice, to await his pleasure. I had never expected the oracle to choose me, as I stood amongst my fellow maiden priestesses; I was short and plump, and several of my fellows were blooming into tall and lissom beauties. But the crowd of girls parted before her aged and bony finger, as she came down from her chair and hobbled, quite directly, right up to me. My friends and fellow-priestesses led me away to starve and purge and bathe me, to give me empty words of congratulation as they dressed me, the eyes of my friends full of mingled envy and pity, the eyes of the others mixing envy with relief. The priestess chosen two years before had left us, her term over, to marry, or I would have asked her counsel; the priestess chosen the last year had been my friend Alete, who lay the next morning as if asleep and smiling, but without breath or life. 

But the look on her face....Alete's face shone faintly, as if she had seen into a mystery, a true beauty. A small part of me still envied that smiling peace. But the rest of me was young, could feel my life's sap rising, and wanted to live. How could a mortal lie with a god and rise unscathed? So I knelt, waiting, shivering despite the warm breeze blowing from the sea, hanging my head as I wondered if I would see the sun rise the next morn.

Light glowed through the dark curls laid over my brow. My first wild thought was that I had slept, and nothing had happened for all my fears, and it was the sunrise I'd hoped to see. Tossing my head to throw my hair back, I raised my eyes, and saw my lord, brighter than any sunrise.

He stood there before the bronze railing and smiled at me, impossibly tall and beautiful and male and young, at just the age of the first beard. And he glowed, how he glowed, golden light spilling from him like a generous fountain. I gasped, and couldn't be afraid for beauty. I knew I would willingly trade all the days remaining to me to lie in those glowing arms, held by my lord's lips and eyes. I understood Alete's smile.

I still don't know if he spoke in words, or if I heard his voice vibrate between my ears, a sound like bronze bells. "Greetings, Thaliae," I heard as he extended a hand to me. I thought, _but can I rise, bound like this?_, and looked down at my hands---

\---and the ribbons were darkening into ash, which a wisp of breeze whisked away. As I stared at my wholly unscorched wrists I heard, amused and kind, "I *am* lord of fire. Now, rise, my Thaliae, and come to me." Though my limbs shook, I obeyed, rising as gracefully as I could, which was not overmuch, and walked on trembling legs for many miles, for four steps. His huge hand enfolded mine, firm and hot; fire flowed from his touch, through my veins and into my heart, and all I could do for a long moment was stand there, embraced by that light and fire, before my mind returned to me and I bowed. "My lord," I whispered, looking down at our joined hands, shy and awed. 

One finger, laid along my cheek like a sweet firebrand, turned my face up, and eyes like wells of fire caught and held my own. "Thaliae, my handmaiden. Who feared my coming."

My heart felt plunged into a wintry brook. All I wanted was to serve my lord, as I had for two years, and already I'd displeased him, or so I thought. But before I could even put fearful thought to apologetic word he smiled, a smile that made me nearly swoon with delight. "Whom I chose, out of all the maidens who serve my high temple in my white-walled city. Yes, you cannot lie with a god and rise unscathed." I felt my face burn to have my thoughts told to me, but then who would know them better? He smiled at me again and added, "But for your scathe, I give a gift. And," his hand rising into my hair to grasp it commandingly,"for your fair service I give a kiss." 

Lips firm and hot on mine, parting my own, arms huge and strong around me, he bore me backwards and I sailed on the tide of his will. What could I hold back, from my lord made flesh? I never noticed the dress as it went the way of the ribbons; all I knew was him, till I found myself lying on furs and clutching him, fingers clenched with passion in his radiant curls, as if he were a mortal like me. Afraid I was disrespectful I forced myself to let go, going limp with the effort, and he pulled his mouth from mine; surprised and bereft I opened my eyes, and he was looking at me, stern and beautiful. "Thaliae, my priestess. I want you entire, including your passion, including your tears." My mouth too full of kisses to speak, I nodded, and he smiled at me, a smile that would warm me even to the chill river of death. "Lest you forget, I will give you a memory," he added, and traced two fingers over my jaw and my throat, and then, when i closed my eyes with pleasure, kissed me right where they join.

The kiss burned with sweet fire, lancing right through me, and I clutched him and screamed, arching my body against his. I needed no divination to feel his satisfaction in his touch as he lifted my hips to his as I heard, "And now we shall see how it is, between a mortal and a god" over my own gasp of pleasure as he entered me. 

And how it was. The thread of my memory breaks; his fire pouring through me took my all, left me nothing for reserve, for calmness, for thought. I remember in fragments and flashes, the firm heat of his shoulders under my hands, his kisses burning across my breasts and belly, the incandescent sweet pain of his entrance. I remember my voice as it flew from my throat, my body as it shook against his, my tears of joy. And I do remember the final shining moment.

"Thaliae." His voice called my eyes to open, the light in them scorched and held me. "Thaliae. Do you know why we do this, why I hold you now?"

"My lord," I gasped. He gasped too; he had taken mortal form, and was bound by its rules, and even as he spoke he made us both shake with the force of his thrusts, his breaths punctuating his words. "To bind the earth once more to the sky and the under-earth. To renew the bonds of deity and mortal. This is why I join with you now, and this is why you must cry out for me."

"My lord" was all I could breathe; my world was filled by him, entire and whole, my eyes filled by happy tears that blurred the smile he gave me. He pulled me tightly to his chest with one arm and stroked his way down my body with the other hand, to reach the kernel of my womanhood and lightly brush it with fire. And then I did scream, as all sight fled my eyes, as all thought was swept from my brain, as the tide of his fire pulsed through me one final, highest, brightest time. But even as sleep reached up dark fingers to claim me, I felt hot lips on my brow as I heard a bronzen whisper, "My maiden Thaliae. I am terrible and wise and kind. Am I not a god?"

*** 

I awoke in the hour before dawn, my limbs still wrapped around a man, our loins still united. He lay draped slantwise across me, one long arm between my breasts, its hand around my shoulder; his face lay hidden in the crook of his other arm, his hair a tousle of short dark waves. I couldn't see him well in the darkness of moonset; like any mortal, he did not glow. I felt the tooth of disappointment before I smiled to myself, thinking, "Did you think He would still be here? Come now, Thaliae, and meet this young man, my partner in sacrifice." And was it odd to think how I embraced and held within me a man whose true face I had not even ever seen; yet, even in that strangeness my hope was that I liked him and he me.

As I touched his shoulder I felt a wisp of connection, and a small spot on it vanished under my hand; it seemed I now had a healing touch. But before I could think on that he stirred, then swiftly awoke, started, and pulled away to face me. 

We regarded each other for a long uncertain moment; all I knew was that he had as little idea of what to say as I did, and I had none. He was little older than I, with a truly pleasant face fuzzed by sleep and drawn by worry and confusion, and he opened his mouth twice before he finally spoke. "My lady," he began in a cracked voice, dark eyes wide; seeing his courage, I trusted my heart and smiled. "I'm Thaliae," I said, reaching out to him, and he took my hand in awe. "And I'm cold. Draw nearer?"

He began to smile at that, and did, reaching out a long arm to pull the water pitcher near and offering it to me as we lay knee to knee. Gratefully, I drank, and laid my head down, and he drank too before he began. "I am Luninas, and....and I hardly remember this night. But I do remember, only---"

"Like fragments of a painted pot. They taught me, that happens to memory when one is god-ridden." I nodded, and he smiled wider, a large mouth with all its teeth. "I remember...   
I stood in the city square with the other youths, listening to the priestess, and then I heard a noise like a thousand rushing winds, and a voice like bronze bells. 'You will bear me tonight, and find your prize in the morning.' And then....fire ran in all my veins and across my vision, and the pattern of my memory broke. After that to now I only remember flashes. " He blushed, then. "I remember you," he said. "how it felt to be in you. How you screamed. You were----" 

I blushed, too, all the way to my nipples, and his gaze followed the blush, then dropped as his deepened. "My lady..." he began again, hesistantly and unsure, starting to recede from me, and something in my heart cried "no!'. Impulsively I reached out again, not wanting our fragile friendship to break. "I have never met a man like this before," I said, forcing the words out against my shyness. "And you have never met a woman this way. So we have faced something new together, and...and we should be friends for it." Rather clumsily said, but it worked, as he favored me with that broad smile again. "Thaliae. Lady. Yes, if you want me I would be your friend; how could I refuse such a blessing?" I smiled at that, but was confused as he added, "this is far more grace than an ill-favored boy deserves."

"Ill-favored? But---you are handsome!" My honest surprise puzzled him, and he asked, "but, my face---", reaching up to one cheek. Finding only smooth skin there, he disbelievingly stroked his face with both hands; when he finally lowered his hands he was beaming so that I almost thought I saw the faintest traces of a golden glow. "Oh, my lady Thaliae, thank you! You healed my scars!"

"You had scars?" I looked at my hand. The gift...."Thank our lord Alixas," I said slowly as I realized what had been done to us. Slowly, but with mounting joy. "He promised us gifts, and he gave them. I can heal! And you are as beautiful as you should be."

"Me, beautiful?" Luninas looked happy enough to cry, and I smiled at him, resting my head on my hand----and gasped, wincing at the surprise of pain. Luninas sat up, alarmed, and I gasped, "What is it? Under my ear---"

He leaned over me to look in the gray dawnlight. "A burn, in the shape...of a kiss." We looked at each other, struck into silence by awe, for a long moment before i smiled. "My scathe," I said, reaching up, and Luninas smiled back and took my hand. "Well, I suppose, a mortal cannot lie with a god and rise unscathed," he said, and my heart skipped a beat. And there was something in his smile....I shook my head and laughed in my heart at myself. "At any rate," I said, looking up at the pink-streaked sky, "we should go down and show ourselves so they know we lived." 

Luninas blushed again at that. "A naked man, walking into a temple of priestesses? I think I will die of it." I laughed, and, clambering to my feet, offered him a hand. "We will honor you as the one who bore our lord Alixias this year, none so much as I."

"Only honor?" If anything, he looked a small bit sad....and I saw why. "And also befriend," I added, looking up into his face. Luninas smiled that broad smile once more, and kissed me quick-firmly, as if before he lost the courage; I squeezed his hand, and hands entwined we left the small courtyard.


End file.
